Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1887-05-14


! OF about 50, from him
AWell, IneverI1 no gasped; whereupon she
embraced him again.
aBe Off with you'll Get away, you minxpp
DO shouted, waving the wooden spoon with
which he was eating his breakfast up and
~, down before the iady's face aBeg your par
. don, gentlemen | am sure haven't en-
scouraged her. Oh Lord she's coming for
me again. Hold her, mr. Holly; please hold
teri can't stand III; can't indeed. This
has never happened to me before, gentlemen,
never. There's nothing against my char
- acter;" and here he broke off and ran as hard
Tas he could down the cave, and for once l
saw the Amahagger laugh. As for tho
Ipan, However, she did not laugh. On the
" CT .hary, she seemed 10 bristle with fury,
which the mockery OF the other women about
only served to intensity. She stood there
literally snarling and shaking with indigna-
tion; and seeing her, wished Jobs scruples
bad been at Jericho-forming a shrewd guess
that lh admirable behavior had endangered
Z our throats. Nor as the sequel shows, was
wrong.
Tho lady having retreated, Job returned In
great state OF nervousness and keeping his
weather eye upon every woman who came
near him. took an opportunity to explain
to our hosts that Job was married man and
had had very unhappy experiences in his do
nestle relations, which accounted for his
presence here and his terror at the sight Of
s1Women; but my remarks were received in
grim silence, 1t being evident that our re-
tainer's behavior was considered as O slight
TO the "householdp at large, although the
women. after the manner of their more civil
lied sisters, made merry ut the rebuff of their
companion.
At first we were much puzzled as to the
origin and constitution Of this extraordinary
race, points upon which they were singularly
uncommunicative AS the time went on-for
the next four days passed without any strik-
ing ovent-Ye learned something from Leo's
lady friende Usane, who, by the way, stuck
tt3that young gentleman like his own shadow.
as to origin they had none, at least so far as
she was aware There were, howcrc-, sha
informed us, mounds OF masonry and many
pillars near the place where She lived, which
was called Kor and which tho wise said had
f04te been houses wherein men lived, and it
was suggested that they were descended from
these men. No one, however, dared go near
these great ruins because they were haunted
they only looked on them from distance.
Other similar ruins were to DO seen, she had
heard, in various parts Of the country-that
is, whenever one of the mountains rose above
the level Of the swamp. Also the caves In
which they lived had been followed out of
the rocks by men, perhaps the same who
had built the cities. They themselves had no
written laws, only custom, which was, how
ever, quite as binding as law. II any man
offended against lilo custom he was put to
death by order Of the father Of tho "house-
hold" | asked how he was put to death and
she only smiled and said that might see one
day soon.
They had queen. however. She was their
queen, but she was very rarely seen, perhaps
7 once III two or :nree years, when she came
forth to pass sentence on some offenders, and
when seen was muffied up in big cloak, so
that nobody could look upon her face. Those
who waited upon her were deaf and dumb,
eea9 therefore could tell no tales, but 1t was
reported that she was lovely as no other
woman was lovely, or ever had been. 1t was
r5unorcd also that she was immortal, and had
Sbwer over all things, but she, Ustane, could
say nothing at oil of that. What she be-
.lieved was that the queen chose husband
from time to time and as soon as female
child was born, this husband, who was never
again seen, was put to death, Then the fe-
Niale child grew up, and took tho place Of the
Queen when its mother died and had been bur-
led in the great caves. But of these matters
r none could speak for certain. Only She was
obeyed throughout the length and breadth Of
the land, and to question her command was
certain death. She kept guard, but had no
regular army, and to disobey her was to die
l asked what the land was and how many
people lived in it. She answered that there
were ten households" like this that she
-r7knew of, including the big "household,"
where the queen was; that all the "house-
holds" lived in caves, In places like this stretch
of raised country, dotted about in vast ex-
tent of swamp, which was only to be threaded
by secret paths. Often the "households'
made war on each other until She sent word
CHAT it was to stop, and then they instantly
ceased. That and the foyer which they
caught in crossing the swamps was what kept
their numbers from increasing too much.
They had no connection with any other race;
indeed, none lived near them, or were able to
thread the vast swamps. Once an army from
the direction of the great river presumably
the ZambesD had attempted to attack them,
but they got lost in the marshes, and at night,
seeing the great balls of fire that move about
there, tried 80 come TO them, thinking that it
was DAlO ShViAiy NehhhP. eAho hoAh VI thtui Ncic
drowned. AS for the rest they soon died of
fever and starvation, not blow being struck
at them. The marshes, she told us, were abso-
mtely impossible except to those who knew the
paths, adding, what could we'll believe, that
lwe should never have reached this place where
we then were had we not been brought there.
These and many other thinga we learned
from Ustane during the four days pause be.
fore our real adventures began, and, as may
be imagined, they gave us considerable cause
for thought. The whole thing was exceed.
ingly remarkable, almost incredibly SO, in
deed, and the oldest part of it was that so far
it did more or less correspond to the ancient
writing on tho sherd. And now it appeared
that there was mysterious queen clothed by
rumor with awful and wonderful attributes
and commonly known by the impersonal but
to my mind rather awesome title of She
Altogether, could not make it out, nor could
Leo though of course he was exceedingly
triumphant over me because had persist
emily Knocked at the whole thing. As fol
Job, he had long since abandoned any attempt
to call his reason his own, and left it to drift